This year promises to include everything from C-band deployments to a possible reset in US-China relations by President Biden. The future of the 5G industry is at stake.
Brett Tarnutzer was in charge of all of the GSMA's spectrum-related regulatory activities, but is now leaving London for Washington, DC, to join SpaceX.
In part two of this series, Navisite COO Gina Murphy shares how the company is working with customers to assist their move to the cloud and help automate their operations.
Some offer predictions and prognostications. Our former cloud analyst steps in with her reactions and reminds us that moving critical telco systems to the public cloud for telcos is a considerable challenge.
How can 5G network operators and public cloud providers work better together to improve the service experience for customers?
Verizon CTO Kyle Malady tells Light Reading: 'I don't see any reason why the technology can't work, but there will be things carriers need to work out if they do adopt it.'
In this mentor spotlight, Gina Murphy discusses the key to completing a successful acquisition, and the importance of building a company culture that supports new ideas, new technology and diverse teams.
Following troubles with a large, unnamed North American customer that may be Verizon, Nokia named Ed Cholerton as its new North American chief.
Omdia's Chris Nicoll provides an overview of how changes in the core of the mobile network will help 5G networks advance and new services emerge.
Wireless network operators are already moving to cloud-native applications, but experts say the industry will see more automation and re-architecting of services in the coming year.
The industry is moving toward containerized network functions (CNFs), but Omdia says operators are 'not done with VNFs yet.'
Verizon's CTO Kyle Malady said that the operator is working to enhance 5G, and that he currently sees no reason to begin focusing on what's next.
John Chapman's focus has extended to PON, 5G and fixed wireless, but he'll 'always be a cable guy at heart.'
The EU is readying drafts of sweeping new legislation to crack down on anti-competitive behavior by big tech, but expect two years of wrangling.
Public cloud systems promise cost savings and convenience, but the wider risks cannot be ignored.
German operator is the latest to move its IT systems into the public cloud, but at what long-term risk?
In 2021, cloud spending will grow seven times faster than overall IT spending, while 5% of doctor visits worldwide will be virtual, says Deloitte.
The cloud computing giant plans to substitute routers developed in-house for equipment it currently buys from Juniper, according to MKM Partners.
MTI will join Fujitsu in providing triband and dualband radios for Dish Network's planned 5G network. The radios will support open RAN interfaces.
Hundreds of partner apps can now run at the edge with Google Cloud and Anthos, writes Google's Amol Phadke.
Docomo in Japan is now selling 5G for around half of what its fellow incumbents charge. If Dish enters the 5G market in the US, AT&T and Verizon might be forced into a similar position.
Japan's SoftBank Group grabs a tenth of Sinch, as Facebook and Salesforce also make acquisitions in the booming customer engagement industry.
Alkira's goal is that CBaaS will assist enterprises in connecting their business applications wherever they're housed – connecting sites together such as data centers or branches on a global scale.
Zoom sees 367% year-on-year revenue growth in the third quarter, but a jump in free user numbers causes profit margins to dip 14.7%.
The TM Forum's much-publicized Open Digital Architecture could enjoy a boost from the latest move.
New Light Reading e-book sponsored by Harmonic highlights some of the early advances made by cable operators and vendors in virtualizing the industry's access networks and expanding their capacity.
Rajesh Mishra, Parallel Wireless' CTO, and Kaitki Agarwal, Parallel's chief product officer, are leaving the company to start A5G Networks, which will focus on open RAN orchestration.
Mavenir is now one of the world's five largest suppliers of mobile core networking technology, which is essentially the brain of a wireless network.
Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: KPN maps out the way ahead; Vodafone suffers German outage; MTS, Ericsson combine on private network for Russian mine.
Following millions of dollars in investments in 2020, DataBank is planning for more than a dozen data center buildouts next year.
Once the process of bringing 128 into Juniper amps up next year, it will be clearer how this acquisition repositions Juniper in the WAN space, and whether this move can improve Juniper's service provider business.
EdgeQ raised $51 million. Celona banked $30 million. And they're not alone. 'Yes, there is more funding available for 5G startups than in the past,' said Amar Kapadai of startup Aarna Networks.
'O-RAN for me is interesting at this point in time, but there's a host of unanswered questions around IP, around R&D, around system integration,' said T-Mobile's Neville Ray.
This brings total funding to $332 million for the Israel-based secure access service edge (SASE) provider. In addition, Cato claims the company is valued at $1 billion.
Partnership to create Open 5G Lab to support the development of 5G use cases for different vertical sectors.
In addition to the firewalls protecting network traffic at a packet level, Masergy is providing customers with Fortinet's secure web gateway (SWG) service for IP traffic protection at the application level in the cloud and on-premises.
The work of physically installing radios on top of cell towers is often the most expensive part of any wireless network buildout. Dish Network said it will use 20,000 Crown Castle towers for 5G.
The company's second cloud-native acquisition in as many months shows it is looking to add to its development resources for cloud applications and programming.
Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Orange gets its tax back; OBS digitizes Tricolor's contact center; Virgin Media launches basic broadband plan for UK welfare claimants.
US operators like Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile are exploring replacing China's cheap handset manufacturers with Indian companies, as the trade war continues.
The Japanese company is pitching its tools and applications to other service providers and says it can satisfy demands for ownership and data privacy.
Chuck Robbins talks up a 'solid start' to the fiscal year as Cisco gains more visibility into its business. Overall revenues slipped in Q1, Cisco expects revenues to be flat or rise 2% in fiscal Q2.
Verizon officials outlined the company's 5G buildout efforts, as well as 5G revenue opportunities spanning 5G smartphones, 5G fixed wireless services and edge computing.
The government has cleared the Production Linked Incentive scheme supporting 4G, 5G, next-generation RAN, IoT access, enterprise and wireless equipment.
The Trump administration appears to have forgotten about its November 12 deadline for ByteDance to divest US operations of the TikTok app.
The e-commerce giant's telecom revolution has yet to attract many followers. That may be about to change.
With eye to NBN sell-off, Telstra embarks on sweeping restructure, breaking into three entities including a tower business, and reveals energy reseller ambitions.
Singapore-based operator continues to feel the effects of the pandemic in H1 FY21, but sees signs of 'modest recovery.'
Predictably solid results are sweetened by an AWS deal expansion, making the cloud giant the preferred provider for Amdocs' internal IT transformation.
US supplier adds 2G/3G capabilities to its cloud-native 4G/5G converged packet core and open RAN solution; sets up 'Center of Innovation' in the UK.
Finnish vendor unveils service that allows machine learning to be deployed at the edge for automated network fixes.
The companies once labeled 'irrelevant' by T-Mobile's former CEO are now accounting for roughly 8% of the industry's new mobile subscribers. And they're not stopping there.
What should customers and the telecom industry expect as the industry starts preparing for its next generation?
Paul Garnett is no longer heading up Microsoft's Airband initiative, a move that coincides with the company's shift in focus to expand broadband in urban as well as rural areas.
The Internet 'bent but did not break,' research firm concludes.
Asia's ride-hailing unicorn continues move into payments and banking, becoming minority investor in the Indonesia-based e-wallet and mobile money provider.
Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Ericsson announcement prompts shares plunge; Telia launches FWA 5G in Norway; France's OVH strikes cloud deal with Google.
Despite losing $1.3 billion in a tech stock buying spree, Masayoshi Son's conglomerate profits after big tech stakes and a Chinese startup's IPO.
Zoom agreed a settlement with the US Federal Trade Commission over complaints it misrepresented the security of its videoconferencing platform to users.
Dish Network is set to join AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile in operating a 5G network. Here are the executives, vendors and government-mandated timeline it's using.
Dish now expects to have some small, preliminary markets deployed in Q1 2021, and a major market up and running by Q3 2021, and remains 'on track' to meet its FCC buildout obligations.
Apple faces a federal class action suit arguing it hid shrinking Chinese iPhone demand, costing pensions funds and other investors billions.
Optical/IP technology specialist beats analyst estimates with Q3 results.
Optical security and performance products buoyed by strong 3D sensing demand star performer, field instrument recovery anticipated as 5G rollout accelerates.
South Korean telco KT Corp has recorded a sharp fall in operating profit in a quarterly result salvaged only by an accounting change.
Comcast said it wants to 'evaluate coverage, throughput and mobility of equipment and facilities' in C-band spectrum ahead of the FCC's December auction of licenses in the band.
IBM assembled 35 companies, ranging from Nokia to Cisco, to underpin its new 'Cloud for Telecommunications' offering for 5G network operators.
Chuck Treadway, who took the reins last month, has until Q3 2021 to assess and present his long-term plan for the company, board chairman says.
South Korea mobile leader SK Telecom has posted a 44% spike in third-quarter earnings, driven once again by non-core businesses.
Light Reading's Mike Dano and Heavy Reading's Gabriel Brown recap the first day of the 5G Transport & Networking Strategies symposium and discuss topics including network slicing and open RAN.
Verizon's CBRS spectrum purchases stretch across a variety of US markets. But the operator did not purchase spectrum in its most congested markets, according to Tutela.
Chipset manufacturer said its investments in 5G 'are coming to fruition.'
Virtualized network operator scraps fees for contract sign-up and number portability in a bid to stimulate demand.
Per the terms being discussed, Walmart would promote smart TVs running Comcast software and get a cut of recurring revenue, the WSJ says.
Companies like Crown Castle and SBA Communications still expect to derive growth from catalysts like Dish Network's 5G plans and the C-band auction. But the timing remains somewhat unclear.
One of the open RAN frontrunners has blamed 'market volatility' for the postponement of its IPO plans.
Dish Network is offering the US Department of Defense a dedicated slice of its planned 5G network, as well as ways for the DoD to deploy services in its own spectrum holdings.
Some have been pushing open RAN as a lever to pull in the 'race to 5G' between the US and China. But the technology might not be ready for America's big midband spectrum rollout.
Facebook's Q3 revenue soared 22% to $21.47 billion, 98.7% from advertisements. It hopes AR will help eventually build some non-ad revenue, too.
Companies shifting their advertising online boosted YouTube's ad revenue by 32%, and Alphabet's overall revenue by 14%.
Three Chinese operators steer a steady course in the first three quarters of the year with moderate revenue growth.
Cloud, e-commerce and video-streaming behemoth beats analyst estimates; AWS still on soaring upward trajectory.
The transition of carrier networks to standard hardware is opening doors for Dell, but the company is making it clear from the outset that it will be much more than a hardware vendor.
Toyota is to invest another 52.2 billion yen (US$500 million) in KDDI as part of a deal to collaborate on connected car technologies.
Telia Carrier's Mattias Fridstrom discusses how the company's approach to fiber expansion varies in different regions, and how network traffic patterns are changing due to COVID-19.
Despite making a loss, Spanish telco giant saw net income grow by 5%, with 1.2% uplift in revenues, announces a FTTH alliance with Allianz.
The US Department of Defense issued a new spectrum strategy that contemplates sharing its spectrum with 5G operators instead of providing it for commercial auctions.
Less roaming pinched Orange's profits, but fiber, Orange Money, and Africa and the Middle East pushed Stéphane Richard's telco back to revenue growth.
IBM's Cloud Satellite customers now have the option to use AT&T's 5G network for their communications, as well as AT&T's new Multi-Access Edge Computing (MEC) offerings.
Chinese supplier boasts solid top-line performance, but operating costs rocket, thanks to wounds incurred in the battle with the US.
Juniper's struggling service provider business turned a corner, growing 5% year-over-year. However, Juniper's cloud business, which experienced consistent growth in 2019 into early 2020, dipped 7% year-over-year.
Ditching Huawei, BT will use Ericsson's RAN equipment alongside Nokia's in its 5G rollout.
Moving away from the single lane, Facebook sees co-investment and partnership as a solution to the digital divide.
Regulator presses ahead with controversial plan to allocate 45MHz for unlicensed uses such as Wi-Fi as it tackles rural coverage.
Microsoft sees its cloud services revenue rise 31% year-on-year, to $15.2 billion, as Verizon chooses Azure for private business 5G.
A top IBM executive used a major fall virtual trade show to make his pitch for the cloud business of major telecom operators. Whether IBM will find traction remains to be seen.
'The Trump administration is going to keep its free market approach,' according to Larry Kudlow, an adviser to the president. At issue is a 5G network operated by the US military.
Fast-growing semiconductor firm ups the data center ante with biggest-ever acquisition, a $35 billion all-stock deal, expected to close by end of 2021.
India's service providers want an auction – tech giants like Google, Facebook and ISPs want 5G E-band (71-76 GHz) and V-band (57-64 GHz) spectrum delicensed.
Starlink, the satellite Internet provider from Elon Musk's SpaceX, isn't confirming any details, but emails touting its 'Better Than Nothing Beta program' offer some insights.
